In this
street, or thereabouts, I got into an omnibus, and, being set down near
Regent's Circus, reached home well wearied.
September 9th.--Yesterday, having some tickets to the Zoological Gardens,
we went thither with the two eldest children. It was a most beautiful
sunny day, the very perfection of English weather,--which is as much as
to say, the best weather in the world, except, perhaps, some few days in
an American October. These gardens are at the end of Regent's Park,
farthest from London, and they are very extensive; though, I think, not
quite worthy of London,--not so good as one would expect them to be,--not
so fine and perfect a collection of beasts, birds, and fishes, as one
might fairly look for, when the greatest metropolis of the world sets out
to have such a collection at all.--My idea was, that here every living
thing was provided for, in the way best suited to its nature and habits,
and that the refinement of civilization had here restored a garden of
Eden, where all the animal kingdom had regained a happy home. This is
not quite the case; though, I believe, the creatures are as comfortable
as could he expected, and there are certainly a good many strange beasts
here. The hippopotamus is the chief treasure of the collection,--an
immense, almost misshapen, mass of flesh. At this moment I do not
remember anything that interested me except a sick monkey,--a very large
monkey, and elderly he seemed to be.
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